Emography is the art of drawing an emotion. It’s a right brain activity that helps teams communicate on a deeper level. When team members first create images of thoughts and feelings, it’s easier for them to talk about difficult topics, resolve conflicts, and identify solutions. This technique is especially effective during organizational change when emotions are running high.

Following a series of acquisitions, Natalie was charged with consolidating three departments into one centralized operation. Her challenge was to retain each of the three leadership teams, maintain a high level of morale during the transition, and identify as many ways to decrease operating expenses as possible. A piece of cake, right? To ensure success, Natalie applied the Three Levels of Communication™.

Natalie met individually with her new leaders and told them how valuable they were to the company. She asked for their help and expertise to build a combined, stronger department that would exemplify the best practices from each of the old departments.

She provided facts and figures to convince these leaders they would have a bright, challenging future–even brighter than if they’d continued to lead their own smaller departments.

The leaders told her how hard they had worked to build best practices over the years. They explained how proud they were of all they’d accomplished and that they were afraid the changes would limit their personal power. When they shared Natalie’s messages, they found their own fear and uncertainty mirrored back to them through the eyes and words of their direct reports.

Natalie understood that all the facts and figures in the world were not going to change how they felt. However, she was just getting started.

Level 2 Communication – Emotional: People buy in and want to support the need for change

The next thing she did was to schedule an offsite. Natalie knew she needed to create a joint experience that would help these leaders feel the power they could achieve through a new, centralized department. She knew that before people could feel the power, they needed to share what they’d already accomplished. She also knew that before they could create a new vision, they had to let go of the old.

So, as part of the offsite, she structured a three-part emography exercise.

Part 1: The first morning, leaders broke into small groups, which represented their original departments. On a flip chart, they drew all the images they could think of to illustrate the accomplishments and culture of their former departments. Then they shared their images and thoughts with the large group. Their new colleagues smiled and said things like, “we need to do that in our new department,” and “what a great idea.” Instead of thinking only about what they wanted to say next, people were listening to each other and considering new ideas.

Part 2: At the end of the day, everyone broke into new groups that mixed leaders from the three departments. The groups drew images that described how they and their direct reports currently felt about the changes they faced as one consolidated department. As each group reported back, they discovered everyone was feeling the same fear, uncertainty, and chaos. That night, over dinner, people talked about how they could work together to keep the best practices from each former team and how to help their direct reports transition. They started to talk about how maybe this consolidation could be a good thing if they learned how to work as a team.

Part 3: Throughout the second day, the leaders identified and prioritized objectives for the coming quarter. At the end of the day, Natalie asked them to mix once more into new groups and create images of how they envisioned the new, centralized department. When each group reported back to the larger group, the energy in the room grew and the offsite culminated in commitments from each to build the strongest department they could.

Level 3 Communication – Practical: People know how to make a personal contribution

The offsite was even more successful than Natalie had hoped. Even so, she knew that when everyone went back to face their daily work, the excitement and commitment could dissipate if the processes and tools did not exist to reinforce the right behavior and actions.

So, she and her leaders created a plan to communicate what needed to happen, why, when it needed to happen, and who was involved. They also provided a variety of ongoing experiences for everyone, kept priorities and progress visible, and celebrated progress against plan.

In the end, this team saved $8M in operating expenses. Morale was high, and people were proud to be part of the new team.

Emography is a useful tool. We often think in words rather than images, and language can be limiting. When we draw representations of what we’re feeling, we can express through metaphor and image what we may not be able to express with words alone. Please contact me if you would like to learn more about how to use Emography with your own team.

Engage employees on all three levels of communication to launch effective organizational change.

Marie was a new business unit leader in this Fortune 500 manufacturing company. Her charge was to launch a transformation, which included evaluating every aspect of their production and introducing Lean Six Sigma.

Marie knew about all the rumblings that had been going on about the anticipated changes she would lead. She understood that in order to achieve this transformation, she would have to communicate in a way that would capture people’s attention and let them know that to survive in the marketplace they would have to change the way they did business.

She wanted to demonstrate, somehow, that change was not an option. She understood that she needed to connect with employees on all Three Levels of Communication™:

Intellectual—employees understood what needed to happen and why.

Emotional—employees experienced and participated in events that inspired them.

Practical—employees knew how they could make a personal contribution.

“I’ve spoken to most of you in this room over the past month,” she said, facing all 500 of the plant’s employees during her first all-employee meeting. “You’ve told me that the way we’ve been doing business isn’t working anymore. That said, we all know that changing what we are used to doing on a daily basis is hard.”

Marie reached down and grabbed a pair of safety goggles. Slipping them on, she picked up an old ceramic jug and a hammer. Raising the jug high so that everyone could see, she smashed it.

The eyes of every person in that room were riveted on Marie.

“This jug will never be the same, no matter how hard we might try to put it back together the way it used to be. It’s been changed by outside forces. Just like us.”

Marie looked from one person in the room to another. “We cannot keep doing business the way we’ve done it in the past. Not if we want to be successful in today’s market. So, I challenge all of you. Help me create new ways to understand and serve our customers. I need your ideas, your insights, and your expertise.”

This is a true story. Marie launched her change that day with the metaphor of a broken jug. She went on and presented some facts and figures. Then, everyone broke into team meetings to talk about what was working and what was not working. Everyone understood they had just taken the first step, and that the work they needed to do was monumental and still before them. But, they were intrigued by this leader’s approach, and they were open to learning more about how they could participate.

Launching change is easy, but it takes a multi-faceted communication plan to ensure effective, measurable organizational change over time. If you haven’t had a chance yet, go to the sidebar next to this blog and download your free eBook: Launching Organizational Change. Learn about:

The Three Levels of Leadership Communication™.

How to avoid the three most common communication mistakes leaders make.

Five critical success factors to accelerate any organizational change.

Stay tuned for future blogs. Effective change requires showing—not just telling employees what needs to happen. A variety of communication techniques exist that will engage employees on an emotional level:

Show a movie clip.

Share a metaphor.

Involve employees with exercises, games, or experiences.

Tell stories.

Over the next few weeks, I will provide examples of movie clips you can use for specific purposes, a list of excellent metaphors, and a variety of exercises, games, and stories that you can use to help accelerate change in your organization. Next week, I’ll feature movie clips.

When you launch a change in your department or organization, how do you engage employees on all three levels of communication?